


I’ll Be Met By Moonlight

by deepestfathoms



Category: Six - Marlow/Moss
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bessie is a patient and loving mum, Lots, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Nightmares, Other, Vomiting, joan doesn’t deserve this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-17 14:15:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21055769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deepestfathoms/pseuds/deepestfathoms
Summary: Bessie awoke to the sound of crying. Loud crying.





	I’ll Be Met By Moonlight

Bessie awoke to the sound of crying. Loud crying. 

Instantly, she hurtled herself out of bed, put on her slippers, and loped out into the hallway, natural maternal worry practically giving her wings.

Maggie was peeking out of her bedroom, staring at the staircase leading downstairs. Maria probably would have been down there already if she weren’t staying with the queens.

That meant it was Joan. Joan was crying. 

“She’s been like this for half an hour,” Maggie whispered when she noticed Bessie. “I-I should have done something… I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. I understand.” Bessie assured her. Maggie was never one to comfort people, nor did she really know how without making things worse, so Bessie thought her just standing there was perfectly reasonable. “Go back to sleep, love. I’m going to go check on her.”

Maggie nodded and then slipped back into her room while Bessie made her way down the stairs and to the bedroom.

Joan was sitting on the edge of her bed, rocking back and forth slowly. From the faint glow of the nightlight, Bessie could see her shoulders violently shaking with the intensity of her sobs.

“Joan?” Bessie called out, not wanting to startle the keyboardist. Still, Joan’s head jerked up.

“J-Jane?” She called out weakly.

Oh.

“No, love, it’s Bessie.” Bessie corrected while walking over slowly. She sat down beside Joan and set a hand on her shoulder. “Are you alright?”

Joan shook her head, sucking in another quivering breath. That quickly turned into a coughing fit and Bessie thumped her lightly on the back to help her along.

“Easy, love, easy,” Bessie murmured, “You’re okay. I got you.”

“B-Bessie?” Joan whispers.

“That’s right. That’s me, hun. It’s Bessie.”

It was too dark to tell if it was really her. Too dark, too dark, too dark-

Joan never liked the dark, even before she got snared in the forest. It was a dark a lot in the 16th century. There weren’t any nightlights, just candles and maybe lanterns, but it wasn’t advised to keep either of those lit overnight (Joan would know. she still remembers the acrid odor and her mother and father yelling). So, usually, she cowered under her blankets with her eyes screwed shut. Unless her brother let her sleep with her, she usually stayed up until the first hint of the sun came out, then she finally deemed it safe to rest.

Insomnia for her was long-running, too.

The keyboardist whimpered sharply and then collapsed into Bessie’s arms.

The scent of the hair she buried her nose into wasn’t Jane’s. Jane smelled like lavender and sugar cookies, not a roasting fire. Not that the other smell was bad. It confirmed that it was, in fact, not her queen she was clinging to.

“You’re alright,” Bessie murmured in her ear, her smooth, velvety accent tickling the baby hairs on the back of Joan’s neck. “You’re alright now, honey. I’ve got you. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

Bessie is caring, like Jane, but she has an aura her that makes Joan feel protected. Like being guarded by a defensive mother bear.

“Do you think you can breathe with me? In and out. Just like me.”

One is rubbing up and down Joan’s spine in soothing strokes, while the other comes around to hold her head against the bassist’s chest. She feels the rise and fall of Bessie’s lungs contracting, hears the steady beating of her heart, and it calms her slightly. She takes in a breath of her own.

“There you go.” Bessie’s smile is sweet, nurturing, supportive. “That’s so good, sweetie. Can you do it again?”

Joan obeys and, slowly but surely, her breathing isn’t as ragged or rapid. She pulled away slowly and Bessie thumbs away a stray tear falling down her cheek.

“I…” Joan starts, but her voice is a brittle rasp, and it hurts to speak. Bessie shushes her.

“Joan, honey, if you’re about to apologize, then I gotta ask you to stop right there,” Bessie said, “Everyone in this house has nightmares. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

Joan nodded a little and she feels Bessie’s thumb stroke back and forth against her cheekbone.

“Would you like to talk about it?” The bassist asked.

Joan shrugged shyly.

“It’s okay if you don’t want to.” Bessie added.

“Jane was dying,” Joan whispers, “A-and she kept screaming and crying in agony . She was in so much pain and I just stood there. I didn’t help her at all.” She sniffled and fresh tears fall down onto the hand caressing her cheek, “Then th-this  thing  ripped out of her stomach and-and-and-”

Nausea bubbles inside of Joan, curling up her throat and into her mouth. She couldn’t swallow it down.

Joan throws up all over herself.

Bessie is moving immediately. Not to get away, but to switch sides so she’s directly behind the heaving girl. It was too late to grab the trashcan in the room, so, instead, she pulls her hair out of the way. Some of the blonde locks were wet with bile, but Bessie didn’t let it phase her if she even noticed.

“It’s okay, sweetheart, it’s okay,” Bessie murmured when she heard the high-pitched noises of pain Joan was making in between coughs.

Joan was absolutely  mortified . She was paralyzed when her stomach finally stopped ejecting itself, frozen in humiliation and terror. More tears spilled free and she sobbed.

“I’m- I’m sorry- Oh god, Bessie, I’m so sorry-” She struggled to speak and nearly threw up again.

“Shh, shh,” Bessie soothed, rubbing circles against the girl’s back, which was clammy with sweat, “You’re alright, darling. This isn’t your fault.”

“But-”

“Hush,” Bessie said, “You were scared, Joan. I don’t blame you for being sick if that’s what you had seen.”

Joan slowly turns her head to look at Bessie. Even when there were trails of vomit dribbling down either sides of her mouth, the bassist still smiles so gently at her. She would have crumpled into her arms if she weren’t covered in a substance she definitely didn’t want to get on the woman.

“Let’s get you cleaned up, alright? Can you stand?”

Bessie gets off the bed first, taking one of Joan’s hands in her own. She lets the girl try to get up by herself, but it’s obvious she’s struggling, so Bessie steps in and helps her to her feet. She feels Joan cringe when the pool of throw up that had been congealing in her lap spilled down her legs and to her floor.

“Shh,” Bessie hushes when she heard a sharp whimper, “It’s not your fault, darling. Don’t worry about that right now. Let’s go get you in the shower.”

Although she didn’t like leaving the shaken up, ill girl by herself, Bessie understood why Joan didn’t want her in the bathroom while she was bathing. While she waited for the keyboardist, she busied herself by cleaning up the mess left behind.

Being a lady in waiting to half of the queens, especially one that was pregnant several times and had her fair share of morning sickness, Bessie was quite used to vomit. It didn’t bother her anymore. The smell, the sound, the sight- none of it phased her. She could eat a whole feast while someone was emptying their stomachs in front of her and be just fine.

And yet she was afraid of heights of all things.

Oh well. At least she wasn’t scared of moths like Maria was.

It’s been almost forty-five minutes since the shower turned off. Bessie wanted to give Joan space, but she was starting to worry.

“Joan?” Bessie called out.

No answer.

“Joan, sweetie, are you okay in there?”

Nothing.

“Joan, I’m coming in.”

Inside, Joan was on her hands and knees, panting heavily, clutching fistfuls of the shaggy shower carpet. The shirt she was supposed to change into was discarded on the floor, but she does have the shorts on. Without a top, her milky-yellow, sweat-soaked flesh is revealed to Bessie.

And the angry red scar that encircled her torso.

The keyboardist didn’t look to be comfortable in the slightest, as her muscles were contracting violently and her bra strap appeared to be digging into taut her skin. Not that she had the energy to wrestle with the clasp right now, though. One hand lifts to hold her aching middle.

“Oh, Joan…”

Bessie saw the girl’s entire body tense up. Joan is trying not to move but she’s trembling too badly. Bessie quickly retrieves a clean blanket before stepping fully into the bathroom. She wraps the soft blanket around Joan, who seemed grateful, but couldn’t show it.

“This just isn’t your night, huh, sweetheart?” Bessie asked while situating herself beside the keyboardist. She takes to threading her fingers through Joan’s hair, since she knew she liked that.

Joan makes a tiny noise. She lifts her head and shudders. A painful cramp seized her stomach with talons of fire and her response to it was by slamming her forehead into the toilet seat. Bessie’s heart clenched a little when she realized she was probably trying to knock herself out.

…Did she really hurt that much? Was the nightmare  that bad ?

“Darling, don’t do that,” Bessie chided softly, slipping her hand down to lift Joan’s head up. The answer she got was an incoherent mumble that morphed into a tight whimper.

“B-Bess-”

“It’s alright. Just get it out of your system. I’m going to go get-”

Joan grabbed Bessie’s by the wrist, holding on with a death grip. She didn’t look up at her, too humiliated to make eye contact, but still refused to be alone like this. Thank God the bassist understood so she didn’t have to pathetically mewl it out loud.

“Okay. I’m staying. I won’t go anywhere.”

Joan wanted to thank her, she really did, but bile rose up in her throat and she gathered enough energy to push herself up to avoid vomiting all over herself again.

Bessie holds her hair out of the way, rubbing her hand gently across the top of her back. She sneaks a few glances at the scar when she does so, tugging down the blanket to get a better look.

It didn’t look like the result of a weapon, rather a rope. A permanent trench was carved along her flesh, a slight dip in the pale expanse that was her back. Definitely rope burn of some kind, but how did it happen? Maybe it was a childhood accident? Somehow Joan got caught in a rope? It seemed unlikely, but not improbable.

Joan shudders when Bessie rubs her thumb against her scar. Her back muscles lock up and then relax. The bassist’s touch was…soothing. The strings of fire lit around her chest diminish slightly.

If only that could also effect her roiling stomach.

The both of them stay in the bathroom for an hour, and Joan ends up throwing up two more times before her body finally relents. She sways and then collapses into Bessie’s chest, trembling in exhaustion and pain.

“There we go, hun,” Bessie said, stroking back her sweat hair from her forehead, “All done?”

Joan nodded. Her stomach was still cramped up, and the sight from her nightmare still replays behind her eyes, but there was no more nausea. Her body just didn’t have the energy to make her sick anymore.

“You poor thing,” Bessie sighed, “You don’t deserve this.”

Joan could only reply in a weak noise. Her cheeks were puffy and tender and her throat burned from all her excessive vomiting, so she couldn’t muster any words.

“Let’s get you back to bed, alright? Would you like to sleep with me tonight?”

Joan was nodding immediately.

Joan curled up into a tight ball the minute she was laid on Bessie’s bed. She’s completely exhausted and barely even awake at this point, but Bessie manages to get her to drink a glass of water before she completely passed out.

Bessie stayed up for around half an hour, just keeping watch over the keyboardist and making sure she was really asleep. Finally, she kissed the top of her girl’s forehead and lays down to rest.

It isn’t five minute later that she feels Joan reach out and cling to one of her arms. An amused, but loving smile came across Bessie’s lips and a nickname rolled off her tongue without even thinking.

“Sleep well,  _dea della luna_ .”


End file.
